For the first time in a long time, Demetrious Johnson isn’t answering questions about his ability to headline a major UFC pay-per-view.

When he steps into the ring and defends his flyweight title at UFC 197 next month, Johnson won’t be carrying the promotional load for the Las Vegas event. That will fall on former light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones and Daniel Cormier, the man who claimed the vacant 205 lbs. belt when Jones was suspended last year.

With those two fighting in the headliner, all Johnson has to focus on is preparing for Henry Cejudo.

“(Jones and Cormier) are going to knock the roof off,” said Johnson, who has won eight flyweight title fights. “So we’re just gonna set it up and they’re gonna knock it out of the park.”

Fighting in the co-main event is a blessing for Johnson, who is considered one of the two best pound-for-pound fighters in the world by most experts. While he’s a technical wizard in the octagon, audiences just haven’t gravitated towards him the way they have with the Conor McGregors and Ronda Rouseys of the world.

That’s no secret, but the UFC has trotted him out in headliners again and again. It’s a position Johnson is comfortable with, but he’s rightfully grown tired of questions about his drawing power.

Considering his in-ring prowess, that’s understandable. The focus really should be on his dominance - the 29-year-old has looked untouchable as he has all-but-cleared-out the UFC’s 125 lbs. rankings.

That’s led to some opponents being fast-tracked into title shots, something that Johnson believes has happened with Cejudo, an Olympic gold-medal winning wrestler with only four UFC fights to his name. That’s a nice pedigree to bring to MMA, but Johnson is adamant that Cejudo won’t have proven anything in the UFC until he takes on one of the flyweight division’s elite fighters.

“This is the easiest sport to get real famous, real fast,” Johnson said. “The thing me and my coaches say is it’s really hard to gauge how good someone really is until you put them against a (John) Dodson, an Ian McCall, me or Joseph Benavidez. Those names? We can fight, we bring the fight.

“When you fight me or Ian McCall or Dodson or those guys, it’s a totally different ballgame because we’re f---ing good.”

LEWIS GETS HIS SHOT

Over the past year or so, it’s seemed inevitable that Derrick Lewis was ready to leap up the UFC’s heavyweight rankings.

With three wins in his last four bouts and a resume of seven fights that doesn’t include a single decision, the Texas native has all the tools the UFC likes in its fighters.

Now, it appears he’s finally going to get his chance to shine in the spotlight.

The UFC announced Friday that Lewis will be stepping in for the injured Ruslan Magomedov on April 10 for a fight with Brazilian veteran Gabriel Gonzaga at UFC Fight Night: Zagreb.

“I just put it out there on Twitter and a few hours later (UFC president) Dana White had called my manager and told me they liked the fight,” Lewis told MMAJunkie.com. “I’ve been pushing for a fight, so I’m just glad they finally gave me an opportunity.”

Lewis is coming off a first-round KO victory over Damian Grabowski in February. A week ago at UFC 196, Lewis and Roy ‘Big Country’ Nelson were caught on video convincing White that they should square off, so most expected to see Nelson introducing Lewis to the divison’s upper echelons at some point in the near future.

“I wanted to fight ‘Big Country and they’re still giving me the option to fight ‘Big Country,’ so either way that’s after this fight,” Lewis said.

In a heavyweight division that’s light on up-and-coming talent, it’ll be worth keeping an eye on Lewis as he attempts to make the leap.

RECORD BREAKER

By all accounts, it appears that UFC 196 will go down as the company’s most profitable event in its history.

UFC officials released a statement Thursday evening saying the card was on track to become the biggest card of all time, and White followed that up Friday.

“Saturday night was amazing for us, we broke so many records,” White told ESPNRadio’s Max and Marcellus show. “It was the biggest pay-per-view we ever did, social media was ridiculous, even FOX, for the prelims on FOX we were No. 1 on all broadcast and cable from 8-10 p.m. in every major demographics. You know it we broke the record on Saturday night.”

Early numbers suggest there were 1.5 million pay-per-view buys for the card, which falls short of the 1.6 million buys for UFC 100. The company raised the price of its pay-per-views by five dollars in 2015, though, so it likely made considerably more profit than it did from UFC 100 in 2009.

Sponsored Links

Co-main fight slot is a blessing for Johnson

For the first time in a long time, Demetrious Johnson isn’t answering questions about his ability to headline a major UFC pay-per-view.

When he steps into the ring and defends his flyweight title at UFC 197 next month, Johnson won’t be carrying the promotional load for the Las Vegas event. That will fall on former light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones and Daniel Cormier, the man who claimed the vacant 205 lbs. belt when Jones was suspended last year.

With those two fighting in the headliner, all Johnson has to focus on is preparing for Henry Cejudo.

“(Jones and Cormier) are going to knock the roof off,” said Johnson, who has won eight flyweight title fights. “So we’re just gonna set it up and they’re gonna knock it out of the park.”